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5 million AD
---- }} '''5 million AD', also called the Age of Mammals, the Ice World, and the Early Futurassic, is one of the hypothetical time periods focused on in The Future Is Wild. 5 million AD is quite similar to the Human era, as most animals have not had time to evolve very much. The world of 5 million AD is defined by its ice age. Much of the northern and southern latitudes are either tundra or below ice, and the equatorial regions have dried, turning the Amazon Rainforest into an enormous grassland and the North American midwest into a cold desert. The expanding ice caps causes sea levels to fall, and the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins become landlocked. The period ends when the ice age finishes and volcanic eruptions become more frequent. As the world warms up again, many of the animals and habitats of 5 million AD disappear, replaced by the hothouse world which will remain until 100 million AD. Geography The geography of the planet itself has changed little since the Human era, as the continents have had very little time to drift very far, so most geographic changes have been caused by environmental conditions such as falling sea levels. The continents have moved somewhat, however: continental drift has closed off the Strait of Gibraltar, causing the Mediterranean and Black Seas to evaporate, giving rise to an enormous salt pan, and East Africa has split off from the rest of the continent, and is now seperated by a thin sea. With so much water frozen at the icecaps, sea levels have fallen considerably, by 500' (150 metres), connecting Britain to continental Europe (via a land bridge known as Doggerland), and the Arabian Peninsula and Japan to Asia. The falling sea levels combined with continental drift have also fused Australia to New Guinea, and turned most of the East Indies into one giant peninsula of Southeast Asia. The icecaps themselves cover most of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, fusing into North America, Eurasia, and Patagonia. The cold conditions of the ice age have wreaked havoc on tropical ecosystems, making the whole planet drier and cooler. In South America, the Amazon River has dwindled and the Amazon Rainforest has dried, replaced by a vast grassland, and in North America, the once-fertile midwestern regions have turned into a cold desert. FIW 1x2 Shagrat herd.png|The ice age conditions of 5 million AD make life difficult for animals in Arctic regions... FIW 1x02 Bay.png|... but conditions ease a little in the Summer. FIW_1x4_Amazon_Praire_hills.png|The cool, dry weather has caused the Amazon Rainforest to dry up. FIW_1x05_Dead_trees.png|The once-fertile American midwest has also suffered from the ice age environment. Climate Life s which populate the Northern European tundra.]] The flora and fauna of 5 million AD is, in general, little different to that of the Human era. Most life is adapted to ice age conditions, and a large amount of human-era animals are absent, having been wiped out in the Human era extinction. .]] , which exists across the Americas.]] Plant life seems to be essentially the same as before, although the loss of the Amazon Rainforest and other jungles would have wiped out many species of plants. Forests of conifers once again cover southern europe, but more northern climes are too cold for most trees to survive. The Human era mass extinction left a number of marine niches, such as those of whales, open to new species, including a bird, the flightless, semiaquatic gannetwhale. Indeed, many birds of 5 million AD have become flightless and highly specialised: the carakiller is a giant pack-hunting plains predator, and the spink is a eusocial subterranean burrower. However, as before, the dominant animals of 5 million AD are the mammals. With most large mammals extinct, previously small animals have grown larger and more diverse, and in the Western Hemisphere, the largest animals are giant rodents, such as the tundra-dwelling shagrat and the highly-succesful rattlebacks of the Americas. Similarly, the place of apex predators like big cats has been taken by giant mustelids, including the snowstalker and the gryken. Other mammals including bats, pigs, and monkeys have also adapted to the new conditions. Extinctions The coming of the ice age finished the work that humans had started, and wipes out a number of species in the Human era mass extinction, including humans themselves. The drying of the Amazon also wipes out a large number of organisms. The waning of the ice age leads to another mass extinction, as many of the animals which were adapted to arid ice age conditions cannot survive in the new, warmer, wetter world which will last until 100 million AD. List of appearances *The Future Is Wild'' **1x01. Welcome to the Future **1x02. Return of the Ice **1x03. The Vanished Sea **1x04. Prairies of Amazonia **1x05. Cold Kansas Desert **''The Future Is Wild'' (US) *''The Future Is Wild: A Natural History of the Future'' *''The Future Is Wild'' (fulldome show) *''The Future Is Wild'' manga **01. North European Icefield **02. Amazon Grasslands *''The Future Is Wild'' animated series **1x11. Sign of the Time Flyer **1x12. De-Tour de France **1x18. Monkey Brains **1x20. Scared Safe **1x24. Queen of the Squibbons, Part 1 **1x25. Queen of the Squibbons, Part 2 **1x26. Snowstalker in a Strange Land *''The Future Is Wild: The Living Book'' Notes *Of the three main time periods featured in the The Future Is Wild franchise, 5 million AD receives the least exposure. It features in the least amount of episodes of the animated series, two of its settings (Mediterranean Salt Flat and North American Desert) have never featured in any spinoff media, and it is not set to appear in The Future Is Wild VR at all. Navigation Category:Time periods Category:5 million AD